Homeschool Highlights: Vikings

We had a lot of fun learning about the Vikings. We read chapter 14 from Story of the World Volume 2. We also read Yo, Vikings by Judith Byron Schachner. It's a jaunty little picture book that is fun but educational and my kids enjoyed it.
                                                 
I made Jake a Viking helmet and braided wigs for the girls, and we turned our couch into a Viking ship while we did some reading one afternoon. (I got the Viking helmet idea from this site.)

Jake's cardboard stick horse had to sub in for a fierce dragon head on this Viking ship

At the end of the week we celebrated all of this new knowledge with a Viking dinner. We built a long house with stuffed animals at one end of the room. (Viking homes in the country often had rooms for animals at one end of the house and rooms for people at the other end.)

We made the Viking bread from the Story of the World Activity Guide. We also had some salmon, peas, and cabbage cooked with onions and spices. Vikings ate a lot of fish and cold-weather crops like peas, onions, and cabbage. It was yummy.

Finally, we had a Viking Thing all dressed in our Viking gear. Every summer Vikings had a Thing--a big meeting where they met to decide laws. Our Thing was our weekly family council. I'm not sure popcorn (our traditional family council food) is very authentic Viking food. We made a quick pitcher of Viking mead (unfermented, of course) to supplement. (Our mead consisted of 4 cups water, 1/2 c. honey, grated orange peel from half of an orange, and a dash of ground ginger. I got the idea from Days of Knights and Damsels by Laurie Carlson, an excellent resource for medieval history.)

Cheers!